Thursday, October 2, 2014

Happy Rosh Hashanah & Yom Kippur, Novus Ordo style!

Where did Our Lord Jesus Christ go?

Using a curtain to hide a large sculpture of Jesus on the cross, the Holy Family Catholic Church in Inverness transforms its altar to host last week's Rosh Hashana service for the Beth Tikvah congregation in nearby Hoffman Estates. This is the 10th year the church has hosted services for the Jewish High Holy Days.

The trickiest part about hosting Beth Tikvah's Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur in the sanctuary of the Holy Family Catholic Church in Inverness is finding a discreet and sensitive way to hide Jesus.

From a suspended perch above the altar, a larger-than-life Jesus Christ reaches out from a clear, acrylic cross in Ernest Caballero's magnificent "Cross of New Life" sculpture, which is the focal point in the Holy Family sanctuary. The sculpture, which cost $750,000 when it was unveiled in 1997, measures 16-feet-by-12-feet and weighs nearly 2,000 pounds. But that overtly Christian imagery doesn't mesh with the most solemn of Jewish High Holy Days.

"So we lower it as far as possible and then put a white screen over it," says Heidi Rooney, communications director for Holy Family.

"My ancestors could have never imagined such a possibility," says Taron Tachman, rabbi of Beth Tikvah, a Reform Jewish congregation in Hoffman Estates that doesn't have space in its building for the crowds drawn to Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur services. This Friday night and Saturday morning will mark the 10th year that Holy Family has hosted Beth Tikvah's High Holy Days.

"The fact that two religions are able to pray in the same sanctuary makes that space even more holy," Tachman says.

"To have our Jewish brothers and sisters atone and ask forgiveness in the same space (as we partake in) the Eucharist on a daily basis, to me, these two thing are very powerful spiritually," says the Rev. Terry Keehan, pastor at Holy Family.

A 10-minute drive from Holy Family, Beth Tikvah can accommodate only about half of the 400 to 500 people who attend High Holy Days services. To prepare for services at the Catholic church, a moving truck hauls the congregation's ark, which houses the Torah scrolls, banners and other items needed for the services, says Steve Pill, who lives in Palatine and serves as co-chair of the Beth Tikvah ritual committee.

Meanwhile, Holy Family not only hides the Jesus sculpture, but it also covers artwork depicting the 12 stations of the cross and even removes bulletins featuring the cross, Rooney says.

"Last year, at Rosh Hashana, we had two weddings," says Keehan, in a statement most priests never have occasion to utter. Both congregations work together quickly to transform the altar from Catholic to Jewish and back again.

No rental price is suggested, and Beth Tikvah makes a donation to Holy Family.

"We call it a mitzveh," Tachman says, using the Yiddish word for a good deed. "They look upon it the same way. It makes them feel good that we're doing this."

Members of both congregations overwhelmingly support the agreement, the rabbi and priest say.

"One year, I put my (priestly) collar on and handed out hymnals just to show them that not only do we welcome them, I welcome them, too," Keehan says. "It's all part of something we take as sacred, and that's welcoming people."

The church created controversy this summer when it fired longtime music director Colin Collette, after he announced online his engagement to his male partner. Keehan says that case involved the church's rules on employment and doesn't change the church's desire to welcome worshippers. Some of the congregation have rallied in support of Collette, and Keehan says a leadership team is working on those issues.

Instead of merely welcoming Beth Tikvah to share its space, the church and the synagogue began sharing thoughts this year as part of a dialogue series between the congregations.

"It's wonderful," says Pill, who explains that people quickly moved beyond the differences between Judaism and Catholicism and now focus on the ways each use religion in their day-to-day lives. "It is pure dialogue. It is not lectures."

Appreciative of the joyful sound of the shofar, the traditional blowing of a ram's horn, to ring in Rosh Hashana, Keehan says Holy Family has sounded a shofar to celebrate the Holy Week that culminates in Easter.

While the union between Holy Family and Beth Tikvah is unusual, the merging of the best of Jewish and Christian traditions isn't unique. The priest points out that Jesus was thought to have attended many Jewish High Holy Days during his youth.

"The Last Supper," Keehan notes, "was a Passover meal."

Above is the Cross of New Life by Ernest Caballero which isn't a crucifix but is still offensive to the Talmudic Jews. It appears to be a bird's eye view of a person swimming backstroke laps in a pool.

Looking up at the artwork. Is that a church or a masonic temple?It matters not as it is soon to be a synagogue!

The Beth Tikvah congregation of Hoffman Estates it too small to host the throngs of Talmudic Jews wanting to say their 'Kol Nidre' prayer. Instead they move its High Holy Days services to the nearby Holy Family Catholic Church in Inverness as part of a special arrangement which is now celebrating its 10th year!

All vows, and prohibitions, and oaths, and consecrations, and konams and konasi and any synonymous terms, that we may vow, or swear, or consecrate, or prohibit upon ourselves, •from the previous Day of Atonement until this Day of Atonement and ...•♦from this Day of Atonement until the Day of Atonement that will come for our benefit.♦ Regarding all of them, we repudiate them. All of them are undone, abandoned, cancelled, null and void, not in force, and not in effect. Our vows are no longer vows, and our prohibitions are no longer prohibitions, and our oaths are no longer oaths.

7 comments:

First of all, this is not a Roman Catholic Church and ,secondly, the presbyters concerned and the fool Bishop who allowed this are not Roman Catholic either. Personally, I do not concern myself with the abuses as these are signs belonging to a liberal modernist movement which is at enmity with The Roman Catholic Church. The responsible parties deny they have actual responsibility that happens outside of their tiny Vatican City. Thus, they too are no longer Roman Catholic since they deny any other than an informal and loose connexion with those who purport to be (neo-) catholic outside of their limited territory.Thankfully, we know who the enemy is and how hostile as he wants to destroy us. Francis is the scatterer and the wolf in the penfold. He can keep his talmudic jewry and all of his sinister machinations. As he is often ill and misses engagements all of this activitiy he sponsors is evidently not doing him any good.

Absolutely disgraceful-but what do you expect from modernist priests who hide the crucifix for the Jews.A priest should never,never,never hide the crucifix !Then again the modernist who calls himself the Bishop of Rome did when he last met his Jewish colleagues .God help us indeed.God Bless.Philip Johnson.

This is pure blasphemy and it shows how the Church is being transformed into the synagogue of Satan as predicted in the Book of Revelations. I don't understand how these priests are unaware of the continuous warnings throughout the Old and New Testament concerning the Jews. How dare they allow Christ their Lord and Savior (creator God) to be covered to cater to those who deny His divine being and ridicule Him daily in their prayers. They also use the media to mock Christ's name along with mocking his most Blessed Mother whose pure soul was pierced when her Son was crucified. These priests are going to be held accountable when they come face to face with the Lord they hid behind a white sheet. Christ has already said he will deny anyone who denies Him in this life and will send them away to the eternal fire. I pray they wake up before its too late !

Its not the first time the Cross of Christ has been covered up ,it happened in the Vatican ,when John Paul hosted a musical evening for Jewish guests ,and at Assisi ,these clergy are acting as if the churches were theirs to dispose of and utilise as pleases them ,no longer Gods House but their house ,they need to be reminded of who paid to have Catholic Churches built ,the Catholic laity not Clergy ,Muslims ,Jews Hindus or Buddhists .they can give over Churches to all religions ,except traditional catholics .

Don't forget that John Paul had the brother of Met conductor James Levine conduct a holocaust concert at the vatican, and, if memory serves, sent his son a gift for his Bar Mitzvah.

These post Vatican II men are not popes, but antipopes. They sit in opposition to Christ our Lord and all the true Vicars that represented HIM and anyone who calls them real popes are, in fact, traitors to all the true popes and to Our Lord and the Most Holy Trinity. They are traitors to all the saints, martyrs, Doctors and Fathers, Holy Virgins etc - everyone in the LItany of the Saints - and all the good clergy and laity that lived and died in, by, of and for our Lord. We all just have to do what we can, personally, to live our lives as good Catholics, Faithful to the end, no matter how gruesome that end might be (and it looks like here in the good old US of A Obama has plans now to inject us all forcibly with a nice Ebola vaccine, guaranteed to GIVE you the disease, apparently so they can reach those nice "Maintain Humanity under 500 million in perpetual balance with nature" Georgia Guidestone goals since that Stonehenge masonic thing outside Elberton, Georgia just had a "2014" stone added in the niche up near the top - date of completion for goal number one perhaps?)

Unless God directly intervenes with the 3DD darkness soon or lets Yellowstone blow - which of course will wipe out a whole bunch of Americans as well - and/or total chaos due to a total failure of the dollar and subsequent economic collapse - or any combination of the above - at least in the US we know that what is looming on the horizon ain't pretty, but if V2 hadn't happened we wouldn't be so far down the road to hell that we're all on now. But we're supposed to bow down and worship John 23, Jp2, and now, Paul 666. As for me and my household - No! No! No!

Indeed, who was it who admired Paul VI the most? Who was it who tried to rush through his CONanisation until checked by Fr Luigi Villa? Who totally personalised the papacy and made himself a cult figure? Who was it who gutted the sainthood process in 1983? Who was it who embraced blasphemous scriptures? Who was it who venerated a Buddhist guru? Who was it who facilitated the great blasphemy at Assissi? Who was it who punished not one of his criminal NO bishops but punished the great and courageous Archbishop Lefebvre who defended tradition? Who was it who inculturated the liturgy leading to countless abuses on a daily basis? Who was it who flirted with every religious leader from Lutheran to Voodooist?